Day: July 22, 2025

When I flew up to la Rochelle on France’s Atlantic coast at the end of June to get my Savannah’s avionics recertified, not only was the visit unsuccessful because the testing station unfortunately damaged my transponder but I also therefore had to fly back to Malbec without it. That in itself wasn’t a big deal. What was more so was that by the time I took off the air temperature was over 35 degrees C and the turbulence I endured during the flight was brutal.

Although I started it up, the GoPro in my cabin let me down yet again and the only video that was recorded was from outside on the starboard wing. The video I made from that footage is shown below.

This is the hardest and longest to edit video that I’ve ever made and I’m glad to see the back of it! Editing the video was fraught with as many problems as the flight itself – more actually as my video editing software, Corel Videostudio Ultimate, kept constantly throwing up sound errors. I think it’s time to move on to another package, but that’s for later.

I mention the problems, none of them insurmountable, that occurred during the flight in the video itself. I made the flight to have the six-yearly test done on my Savannah’s avionics but in the end that didn’t happen because the testing station unfortunately somehow damaged my transponder and removed it for repair. That means that when it’s been fixed I’ll have to return and do the whole flight over again.

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I had to fly back to Malbec without my transponder but that was no big deal. I made a video of the return flight which appears in a follow-up post.